Weekly Closer Rankings: Week 1

Closers are a volatile bunch, so you can expect several closers that you drafted over the last few weeks to lose their job this season. It happens every year. We may see a change in the closer role in Chicago fairly soon if Carlos Marmol cannot gain some semblance of control on the mound. Manager Dale Sveum already has shown his hand in game one, and Marmol's leash is short. Very short in fact. Kyuji Fujikawa is the odds on favorite to take over the closer role should Sveum decide to make a switch in the coming days or weeks. As a result, I have moved him up as my 22nd ranked closer even though he doesn't have the role yet.

Here are my Closer Rankings for Week 1 of the 2013 baseball season:

I made a few minor changes in the closer rankings this week including:

• I moved the trio of Grant Balfour, Steve Cishek and Jason Grilli above two closers who I think are shaky/injury risks: Huston Street and Joel Hanrahan, and Rafael Betancourt, who is a trade candidate, and could move to a set up role if dealt.
• I moved the Chris Perez and Vinnie Pestano to my 16th ranked closer, just ahead of Dodgers closer Brandon League.
• Carlos Marmol, he of the poor Opening Day performance, was dropped to the 30th ranked closer spot, just ahead of Jose Veras, and he could fall out of my Top 40 ranked closers/MRs with a few more performances like Monday's near blow-up.
• Mitchell Boggs moved up to my 26th ranked closer spot now that we know he will probably be closing for at least the month of April. Something tells me that if Motte is out longer than expected, that we will see Trevor Rosenthal working the ninth in St. Louis before mid-year.